Tornadoes · United States · West Virginia · 2000

F1 tornado, Branchland, West Virginia, August 9, 2000

This F1 tornado ran 1.5 miles across Lincoln County on August 9, 2000, touching down at 9:20 PM EDT and reaching 100 yards wide. It killed nobody, and did $200,000 of property damage.

The rating scale

Tracks are drawn in the color of the rating. The Fujita scale rates the damage rather than measuring the wind: the speeds are what that damage is taken to imply.

  1. F040 to 72 mph

    Light damage. Surface peeled off some roofs, gutters and siding damaged, branches broken, shallow-rooted trees pushed over.

  2. F173 to 112 mphthis tornado

    Moderate damage. Roofs badly stripped, mobile homes overturned or badly damaged, exterior doors lost, windows broken.

  3. F2113 to 157 mph

    Considerable damage. Roofs torn off well-built houses, frame homes shifted on their foundations, mobile homes destroyed, large trees snapped or uprooted, cars lifted off the ground.

  4. F3158 to 206 mph

    Severe damage. Whole stories of well-built houses destroyed, large buildings badly damaged, trains overturned, trees debarked, heavy cars lifted and thrown.

  5. F4207 to 260 mph

    Devastating damage. Well-built houses leveled, structures with weak foundations moved some distance, cars thrown and large missiles generated.

  6. F5261 to 318 mph

    Incredible damage. Strong frame houses swept off their foundations, car-sized missiles thrown more than 100 meters, steel-reinforced concrete badly damaged, high-rise buildings deformed.

  7. Unrated

    The survey recorded a tornado but could not put a number on it, most often because it crossed open country and damaged nothing a rating can be read from.

The record

Rating
F1
Date
August 9, 2000
Touchdown
9:20 PM EDT (01:20 UTC)
Path length
1.5 miles (2.4 km)
Path width
100 yards (91 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
Property damage
$200,000
County
Lincoln County
Touchdown point
38.230, -82.220
Lift-off point
38.230, -82.170
Record number
1043

What the Weather Service recorded

The second round of tall thunderstorms moved through during the evening hours, spawning a few tornadoes. The lightning activity peaked around 2000E with around 200 strikes per minute in the Huntington to Charleston region. Approximately 75,000 customers were without electricity. Luckily, the storms continued to move, resulting in just minor flash flooding. It was the 4th consecutive day with thunderstorms for many of these counties.

Trees were chopped off midway up their trunk, plus bark was peeled off of other trees. Dwellings suffered roof damage. At least 2 mobile homes were destroyed along Peyton Branch Road.

From NOAA NCEI's Storm Events Database, the narrative the local forecast office wrote for Storm Data.

The warnings

26 minutes of warning. NWS RLX issued a tornado warning for this county at 00:54 UTC, 26 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 01:30 UTC.

Issued (UTC)ExpiredProductOffice
17:34 UTC18:15 UTCSevere Thunderstorm WarningRLX
00:54 UTC01:30 UTCTornado WarningRLX

Every warning and watch covering the touchdown point that day, from the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service products. Lead time is measured from the issue of the warning in force to the touchdown time in the database, both of which were recorded to the minute by different people.

The forecast that day

The Storm Prediction Center had this point in a Slight Risk. The outlook in force was issued at 01:17 UTC.

SPC's Day 1 convective outlook as it stood when the tornado began, read at the touchdown point. The same archive is on the radar archive.

The air that afternoon

The radiosonde launches on either side of the tornado, from the nearest station that was launching then, drawn and analyzed the way Storm Lab does: the same diagram, the same parcel and shear definitions SPC's mesoanalysis uses.

Cncnati-Daytn, OH (KILN), 00:00Z

1.3 hours before the tornado, 193 km from the path. August 10, 2000.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Cncnati-Daytn, OH at 00:00Z on 2000-08-10Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 367 joules per kilogram, CIN -164, lifted condensation level 1279 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCLLFCEL10008507005003002001001 km2 km3 km6 km9 km12 km15 km-30°-20°-10°0°10°20°30°40°
Temperature in red, dew point in green, the mixed-layer parcel dashed. The warm shading is its CAPE, the cool shading the inhibition it has to break through.
HodographHodograph, Cncnati-Daytn, OH at 00:00Z on 2000-08-10The wind through the lowest 10 kilometers as a curve, rings every 10 meters per second labeled in knots. Zero to 1 km storm-relative helicity 59 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 33 knots.19395878Sfc1 km3 km6 km9 kmRMLM
The wind turning with height, colored by layer: ground to 1 km, 1 to 3 km, 3 to 6 km, 6 to 10 km. RM and LM are the right and left moving storms Bunkers' method gives; the shaded area is the 0 to 1 km storm-relative helicity.
Mixed-layer CAPE
367 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-164 J/kg
Surface CAPE
2677 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
1279 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
33 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
12 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
59 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
155 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
4.7 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

Cncnati-Daytn, OH (KILN), 12:00Z

10.7 hours after it, 193 km from the path. August 10, 2000.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Cncnati-Daytn, OH at 12:00Z on 2000-08-10Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 0 joules per kilogram, CIN -64628, lifted condensation level 1104 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCL10008507005003002001001 km2 km3 km6 km9 km12 km15 km-30°-20°-10°0°10°20°30°40°
Temperature in red, dew point in green, the mixed-layer parcel dashed. The warm shading is its CAPE, the cool shading the inhibition it has to break through.
HodographHodograph, Cncnati-Daytn, OH at 12:00Z on 2000-08-10The wind through the lowest 10 kilometers as a curve, rings every 10 meters per second labeled in knots. Zero to 1 km storm-relative helicity 74 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 32 knots.193958Sfc1 km3 km6 km9 kmRMLM
The wind turning with height, colored by layer: ground to 1 km, 1 to 3 km, 3 to 6 km, 6 to 10 km. RM and LM are the right and left moving storms Bunkers' method gives; the shaded area is the 0 to 1 km storm-relative helicity.
Mixed-layer CAPE
0 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-64628 J/kg
Surface CAPE
0 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
1104 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
32 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
16 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
74 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
143 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
2.9 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The surface observations

Huntington/Tri Stat (HTS), 35 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

Time (UTC)Temp (°F)Dew point (°F)WindGust (kt)Pressure (mb)Weather
23:51 UTC8578230° 7 kt1011.5
00:09 UTC84.278.8220° 10 kt1010.2TS
00:33 UTC71.668310° 25 kt411013.5+TSRA BR
00:41 UTC69.866.2290° 14 kt361013.9+TSRA BR
00:51 UTC6967280° 9 kt221014.2TSRA BR
01:51 UTC6968120° 7 kt1015.9TSRA
02:51 UTC6968230° 11 kt1017.9TSRA BR
03:02 UTC69.868200° 11 kt1016.9TSRA BR
03:12 UTC69.868240° 4 kt1017.6TSRA BR

From the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of airport observations.

The radar

The Charleston,WV radar (KRLX), 42 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 01:19 UTC.

Open the radar archive at this moment, over the track

Reflectivity and velocity, decoded from the Level II archive in the browser. Volumes take a few seconds to open the first time.

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 2000 tornado in West VirginiaEvery tornado in West Virginia since 1950Warnings in force in West Virginia nowThe forecast where you are

The other tornadoes of August 9, 2000

7 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

DateTimeRatingWherePath (mi)Width (yd)DeathsInjuriesDamage
August 94:00 PM EDTF0Shenandoah, VA0.210$1,000
August 94:20 PM EDTF1Madison, VA0.550$10,000
August 97:03 PM EDTF2Somerset, ME3.0500
August 97:39 PM EDTF0Lake, OH1.050$30,000
August 97:50 PM EDTF1Scioto, OH2.050$300,000
August 97:26 PM CDTF1Cabell, OH to WV2.780$480,000
August 98:40 PM EDTF0Putnam, WV0.350$1,000

What this means

Ratings are the survey's, read off the damage rather than measured; the rating scale is above. Tornado counts rise through the record as reporting improved, so a year in the 1950s is not comparable with one today except for the strongest tornadoes, which were always noticed.

Sources

NOAA Storm Prediction Center tornado database, 1950-2025, the official record kept by NOAA's Storm Prediction Center.